Blu-Ray Review:
Ultimate Matrix
By Jason Gillard
*Screenshots are not from the Blu-Ray source.
Movie
I am sure a lot has been said about these movies in the past. The first movie was a huge hit! I remember missing it when it was out theatrically. There was a huge buzz when that film was out and I remember hearing about it. After I saw the movie, I was kicking myself that I had not seen it on the big screen. I remember when it first came out on DVD. It was one of the highest selling DVDs at the time. It was the DVD that everyone was buying a DVD player for. For those of you who don't know what the series is about I will try to give you a little plot synopsis. The basics are that we are currently living in a simulation and that is run by machines. Nothing we can see or touch is real. Humans are born and harvested for one thing....energy. For some reason the other two films Matrix Reloaded and Matrix Revolutions were never as popular as the first film. I am not quite sure why that is because I liked all three films a lot. I agree that the Reloaded and Revolutions didn't have the same mystique as the original Matrix, but they were still fun films none the less. The Wachowski brothers had brought us a world we have never seen before. They utilized filming techniques that were never done before and now in a lot of movies you can see that people copied their technique. For me all 3 films were brilliant and designed to make you think. If you haven't seen these movies you really owe it to yourself to see them. Plus as an added bonus in this set you get a copy of the Animatrix (in HD), which is a collection of animated films based on the Matrix.
9 out of 10
Video
All movies in the set are presented in 1080p and if you owned the previous DVD versions of these movies you are in for a treat. The upgrade is like night and day. The detail is really amazing, everything can be seen. From Trinity's leather suit to Neo's flowing black cape the quality and level of detail is incredible. There is a slight downside to this though. With all this detail some of the CG elements come across as even more fake. An example of this is where Neo is fighting all of the agent smiths in Reloaded. The switch between live action Neo and the CG version is even more apparent with the added clarity. For me I think this is just nitpicking though. Out of three films I think The Matrix looks the best. I would assume this is because it probably had the most room for improvement since it's the oldest film. Overall if you had the old set of films you will definitely be pleased with the upgrade your getting here. If you had the HD-DVD version you won't see much of a difference at all.
8.5 out of 10
Audio
I don't think you could really ask for more when it comes to the sound in this set. This is demo material here folks, and it's the type of set you want to turn up loud, real loud. All three films present amazing surround sound sequences. For me some of the best areas of sound are the lobby fight and the helicopter sequence. As well, the highway sequence in Reloaded and the Mech fight in Revolutions all give an audio sequence that is really astonishing. All three films are given the Dolby TrueHD 5.1 treatment and I don't think you could ask for better tracks than what they have given you here.
10 out of 10
Extras
Here is what is included in the extras! There is a ton of material here. Almost 35 hours worth!
Disc 1 - The Matrix
Introductions
Audio Commentaries
"The Music Revisited"
Documentary: "The Matrix Revisited"
Vignettes
Promotional Gallery
Disc 2 - The Matrix Reloaded
Documentary: "Enter the Matrix"
Documentary: "Car Chase "
Documentary: "Unplugged"
Featurette: "Teahouse Fight"
Featurette: "I'll Handle Them"
Archive: "Exiles"
Promotional Gallery
Disc 3 - The Matrix Revolutions
Documentary: "Behind the Matrix"
DoDocumentary: "Aftermath"
Documentary: "Siege"
Featurette: "Crew"
Featurette: "Hel"
Featurette: "Super Burly Brawl"
Archive: "New Blue World"
Promotional Gallery
Disc 4 - The Animatrix
Audio Commentaries: "Voices"
Featurette: "Scrolls to Screen: The History and Culture of Anime"
Documentary: "Execution"
Disc 5 - Bonus
Documentary: "Return to Source: Philosophy & The Matrix"
Documentary: "The Hard Problem: The Science Behind the Fiction"
Disc 6
Multi-Part Documentary: "The Burly Man Chronicles"
Still Gallery: "Zion Archive"
Montage: "Rave Reel"
Matrix Online Preview
Promotional Gallery
Plus each movie has what Warner calls "The In-Movie experience" which is a picture in picture general overview of the making of each film.
So as you can see there is a truckload of material. I am not going to go over every special feature or this would be 40 page review. But I will highlight my favorites on each disc. The first thing I should point out is that all the special features are in standard definition. This goes against my cardinal rule that if your buying something in HD, then the extras should be HD as well, but since there is so much content here, I am willing to overlook it this time. You are getting every feature that was included in the SD version of the Ultimate Matrix. The only thing new extra is the "In Movie Experience", which I will touch on later.
On Disc 1 my favorite extra has to be the documentary "The Matrix Revisited". This is a 122 minutes long and chronicles the entire production from beginning to end. There is a lot of material here and if your a behind the scenes junkie like me you will enjoy every minute of it. Also, I really liked "The Music Revisited." This was originally an Easter egg on the original DVD set but it is now easily accessed here. It is 41 audio only music cues from the film, a very cool feature indeed.
On Disc 2 my favorite extra would have to be the documentary on "The Car Case". This goes over how they had to build their own highway and details exactly what had to be done to produce the amazing car case scenes. I also liked the "I'll Handle Them" featurette that details the Merovingian Chateau sequence.
On Disc 3 my favorite extras are the documentary "Aftermath which goes into detail about post production on revolutions and all the extra detail needed to bring the film to what we see today. I also liked the featurette "Super Burly Brawl" which details another amazing fight sequence. Also for those who liked the crazy machine attacks in revolutions you should check out "Siege".
Disc 4 is the Animatrix. The best feature here was "Execution". This seven part documentary takes you short by short and gives you a rundown on what it took to complete these amazing animated shorts.
On disc 5 I have a hard time recommending extras here because I found both of them sort of boring. If I had to choose though I would go with "Return to Source: Philosophy & The Matrix".
On disc 6 the best feature here is the "Burly Man Chronicles". This documentary is 95 minutes long and is basically a production diary of the 4 year shoot. The amazing part here is there is little repetition of the previous material. It's a good documentary that is certainly worth your time if you like the films.
The last feature I should talk about is the "In-Movie Experience". This is a picture in picture behind the scenes and there is one for each film. This is great if you don't have the time to sit through the over 35 hours of material.
9 out of 10
Overall
If your a fan of these movies or you don't own the original Ultimate Matrix set this is a no-brainer. Your getting amazing HD versions of all three films including the Animatrix. You're also getting some amazing sound and a collection of extras that is almost to the point of overdoing it. I certainly give this set my highest recommendation.
9.5 out of 10
Highly Recommended
Ultimate Matrix is available now from Amazon.com